21/03/2009

I'm not sure how to start this off, so I'm just gonna start.I don't believe anyone choses to be homeless, poor, or whatever you wanna call it. No one in their right mind decides "Hey! I can be homeless! Then I don't have to work and can get rich from government aid!"First off: no one gets rich of the money they get from social services. And that's only if they get money from social services at all. I'm not sure how the terms differ from country to country, but at least up here you have be actively seeking employment to get some financial support. This means you have to seek any and all jobs you have even a minimal chance of getting, and some you don't even fill the requirements for, just in case. The requirements seems to be "Can you send them an application? Then do it." I'm not sure what they point of applying for a job they're not going to give your is, except for making you feel stupid, and annoying the employer. But you have to apply for a certain number of jobs to get money, and I suppose just applying to whatever job you find is a good way to get money if you're desperate.It's safe to say that you only seek social security if you're desperate and don't have any other choice.Generally speaking that is.

Then there's people with various addictions. This isn't a choice either. It's an addiction, which means that their basic motivation (like a career, a nice dinner, etc) is replaced with one thing, and one thing only. The substance they're addicted to. Nothing else matters anymore. "Family is only good if it helps me get my drug." Same with friends, jobs, and so on. It's all just tools to help achieve a goal. Most people suffering from an addiction don't want to take the drug. But their bodies, distorted by chemical abuse, demands it. It's hard to fight something that's stronger than the need to eat and sleep. Imagine if you're really tired or hungry. You can of course skip both sleep and food for a time, but how does that make you feel? How long can you keep it up?And it's hard to cure as well, because an addiction changes the body. The change doesn't disappear just because you don't take the drug anymore.If you've stopped smoking you know what I'm talking about. Sometimes you feel the need to have a smoke, even if it's been years since you had one the last time.Some drugs cause a distortion right away, other's take a few doses. Generally speaking this is true for medicinal drugs as well. If you're taking anti-depressants for some time you're gonna have to switch to another pill that cures you're addiction to the anti-depressants once you stop taking them.Generally speaking you should be careful when it comes to drugs. I'm not saying that "Drugs are bad!", just that they can be really fucking horrible and fuck you up for life if you're not careful. Kinda like driving. Crash once and you're dead or in a wheelchair for life.

So, why should you listen to me in the first place? I've never been homeless, but it's been close once or twice. If worst comes to worst I've got family I could move in with, so I'm lucky that way.Have I ever been poor then? I haven't been so poor that I've had to beg, but it has crossed my mind at one point. I have been on social security though.

You know what the hardest part of applying for social security is? The psychological aspect of it. At least for me anyway. I'm a bit proud of myself. I hate borrowing money from people, and I feel like I should be able to take care of everything myself. I bet it'd be worse if I had a regular job and then had to seek help to survive though.It's the American dream of the proud self-made man that's infected our motivations, you might say.If you just work hard and determined towards a goal you'll make it! Too bad it doesn't work like that. You need help and support from others to get started at least. A family that helps motivate you probably helps too.So what if your only motivation is "not starving to death under a bridge"? First of you make sure you somehow get money, begging might work, unless people shouts "Get a job!" and gives you disgusted looks.But begging, social security, and so on has a drawback. People that have never been close to being poor will despise you. They'll happily assume that you're just a lazy slacker with no motivation. You probably seek social security just to get money for meth anyway.Feel free to protest, but I know I've thought "Fucking drunks" in disgust at beggars at times.

There's one things I'll remember for the rest of my life though. I was on a buss on the way to Spain I think, when we stopped for some time in Brussels and decided to walk around for a bit.I'm not sure how I ended up there, but I found my way into a long thin mall with small exclusive boutiques like offices in a corridor.And on the stairs of one of them a young woman was sitting crying with a paper drinking cup in her hand and an expression of hopelessness and despair in her face like I've never seen before.It felt like a bucket of cold water over my head with a punch in the stomach straight afterwards.I got choked up, almost collapsed to my knees crying with my head in my hands right there and then. I mumbled some words about being sorry and not having any money and almost ran away from her.And the buildings of the administrative sections of the European Union was only a few hundred meters away.